1981 Donruss, Floyd Bannister

#286 Floyd Bannister

Here is a card that I sent out on 10/27/10, the same day that I sent out Joe Amalfitano's card that I posted yesterday. This one, however, made it back to me about a week sooner than Joe's.

I was inspired to write to Floyd after talking to his son, Brian, at Royals Fanfest last year. Brian has one of the nicest and most deliberate signatures in baseball, and all of his in-person autographs look nearly identical (I've seen some sticker autos that have been shortened). I told Brian how much I enjoyed his signature and he thanked me and told me that he got it from his dad. He then added that if I haven't seen his dad's signature, I needed check it out. So that became one of my goals for 2010.

I have plenty of Floyd's cards that I could have sent him. The only thing was that I didn't want to just send him any card, I wanted to send him this card. The problem with that is that I didn't have this card at this time last year. Luckily, I acquired the card at some point over the summer (I'm not positive, but I think it might have been from Brian at Play at the Plate when I won the his first manager fired contest) and I finally got it mailed to him in the fall. I must say that I am not disappointed. Floyd does have a great-looking 'graph.

If I did not know any better, I would think that is a picture of Brian on this card. Speaking of Brian, he will be pitching for the Yomiuri Giants this season.

'81 Donruss Tracker: 81/100

1960 Topps, Joe Amalfitano

#356 Joe Amalfitano

Here is another card that I got signed through the mail somewhat recently. I sent this card to Joe on October 27th and I got it back November 15th.

Joe played in the Major Leagues for parts of ten seasons. He made his Major League debut with the Giants in 1954 and he played a few games with them in '55, as well. Then, he got stuck in the minors for four years before finally making it back up in 1960. He stayed in the big leagues for good after that (for the most part).

Joe played for the Giants, Colt .45s, and Cubs during his career. He was a .244 career hitter that mostly played second base. He never made an All Star team and he never played in the World Series. He had seven home runs in his career and one of them came off of Bob Gibson. That has to count for something.

After his playing days were over, Joe went into coaching. But, I am going to save that for another day (probably Saturday, in fact).

The funny thing about this card is the airbrushing. The main photo has Joe wearing pinstripes, which I am pretty sure that the Giants never wore. Add in that fact that, prior to 1960, Joe hadn't played in the Majors since 1955 and now it becomes difficult to figure out what uniform Joe is actually wearing in that picture. He spent 1959 playing for the Toronto Maple Leafs (not the hockey team) and as far as I can tell, they did not wear pinstripes. He played for the Phoenix Giants in '58 and I doubt that they would wear pinstripes since the parent club didn't. Then you go back to 1957, the year he played for the Dallas Eagles. I don't know about the late '50s, but I do know that the Eagles did wear pinstripes in the early '50s. What do you think that odds are that the main photo is a picture from his Dallas days? I guess that it is not out of the question. If it is, I wonder if Topps had been saving that very photo for when Joe did eventually get called back up.

Here is a photo of a Dallas Eagles player from 1952. This picture is from "Baseball in the Lone Star State" by Tom Kayser and David King. The pinstripes did not show up too well in the scan, but they are there.

More Padrographs!!!

I usually don't post on Wednesday since that is my long day at work (which may be changing in two weeks). But, when I got off work tonight, I was very pleased to find a random package waiting for me. It was another great package from Rod, the man behind Padrographs. In the package was 28 new autographs for me, as well as the Royals 1996 Royals police set (minus one card) and a few new Royals cards. Most of the autographs will be shown on here in some form or another, but I wanted to showcase this one tonight.

Here is a Padrograph original of Cedric Hunter. While I am not familiar with Cedric, that is not the point. The point is that this is a great looking custom card. The best part about it is that it has a front and a back and that it is thick. It is thicker than regular card stock and almost as thick as a game-used card. With a little (OK, a lot) of help from Dave, of Goose Joak, I put together a custom card with a front and a back and a little filler in between. Unfortunately, I think the pressure of all the cards in my binder is the only thing keeping my card in one piece. That is not the case with this Padrograph. This baby seems sturdy. So, if you ever need any advice on putting a custom card together, Rod may be able to help you out.

Here is the front.



Even though the front is the side that is signed, I almost like the back of the card better. The reason for that is because Rod probably has the best logo in the baseball card blogosphere. Check it out.



If you are an autograph collector that runs a blog, and you are not jealous of that logo a bit, than you are only lying to yourself. That logo is great!!

As I mentioned, Rod also sent me the '96 Royals Police set. I was a bit surprised to see this since Rod emailed me about a month ago to see if I could find a card out of the set for him. He was of course wanting the Bip Roberts card from the set, and I am guessing that he found it since he sent me the set without the Roberts card. It looks like he found his Bip card, but he had to buy the whole team set to get it. That works out for me.



I think that I have a signed copy of the Damon card from this set. The cards are a little bigger than standard cards, therefore I do not keep them in my autograph binders.


Overall, it was another great package from Rod. Right now, I do not know how I am going to go about posting all of these autographs. I will post some on my recap that I am doing right now, but I will save some for a later date. But, I will get them all posted at some time or another.

Thanks, Rod!

I have a thank you package in mind for you that is not baseball related. When I will find the time to drive to the place to get it for you , I do not know. But, I do have something special planned.

1952 Bowman, Ned Garver

#29 Ned Garver

Here is the second Ned Garver card that I sent to him in November. When I started looking to buy some cards of the guys that were going to be at the Kansas City A's reunion, I first went to checkoutmycards.com to see what they had. They had a bunch of Ned Garver cards on there at the time, but they didn't have any cards of him in a Browns uniform that was in my price range. So, I headed to the last resort, Ebay, and I found this card for about $3.50 plus postage. I bought the card and then I ended up finding the '49 Bowman card (yesterday's post) from checkoutmycards about a week later. Ned was the only KC Atheletic at the reunion that I bought two cards of.

I mentioned yesterday that Ned was the last player to win 20 games for a team that lost 100 or more. That was in 1951, Ned's fourth season in the Major Leagues. That was by far the best season that he had in his fourtteen-year career, as he would never win more than 14 games in a season afterwards. That was also the only season that he made the All Star team and he also led the league in complete games that year with 24. But, has another distintion from the 1951 season. Ned hit .305 that year, which was the second highest batting average on the Browns team (minimum 100 plate appearances).

Ned played with the Browns, Tigers, A's, and Angels throughout his career. He finished his career 129-157 with a 3.73 ERA and 153 complete games. He also had a lifetime batting average of .218 with 7 home runs.

1949 Bowman, Ned Garver

#15 Ned Garver

Here is a card that I got signed through the mail in November. I mailed the card on the fourth and I had it back eight days later.

This past summer, Ned was one of the guys that attended the Kansas City A's reunion that was put on by the Kansas City T-Bones. I intended to get to the ballpark early so that I could find these guys and get some cards signed. But, instead, I ended up being stuck in a four mile stretch of interstate for nearly two hours after there were two accidents in a work zone. So, rather than getting to the park early, I got there as the KC A's were being introduced. By the time I made it into the park, I got to see the final three guys take the field. I went down by the field on the side that the guys entered on, only to see them leave on the opposite side. Rather than trying to chase them down, I just stayed by the T-Bones dugout to get the few cards I had of them signed.

Throughout the course of the game, I was able to get eight KC A's autographs from seven different guys. But, I didn't get Ned's. So, when I finally dropped the $15 to sign up for SportsCollector.net, I got his address and I sent the two cards I had bought for him to sign. This was obviously one of the cards I sent and I was happy to find this card on checkoutmycards.com for about $3. I was totally shocked when I got the cards back because, not only did he sign them both, but he added two more signed cards (two different Diamond Signature cards) as well as a postcard for his book that had a note that read "Zach- Sorry I missed you in KC. Maybe next year. Ned". How cool is that?

This is now the second card from this set that I have got signed and it is also the very first signed St Louis Browns card that I have. In fact, thanks to writing to Ned, I believe that I now have three signed Browns cards.

If you had never heard of Ned, don't feel bad. I hadn't either. But, come to find out, he does indeed have a claim to fame. Ned was the last pitcher to win 20 games for a team that lost 100 or more. He accomplished that feat in 1951 with the Browns. He finished the season 20-12 (his only 20-win season) on a team that went 52-102. That may be an accomplishment that never happens again.

2004 Upper Deck Vintage, Dustan Mohr

#282 Dustan Mohr

Here is the second of two Dustan Mohr cards that I got signed in Wichita while he was a member of the Wingnuts in 2009. I posted the first card in November and you can read about Dustan Mohr and how I got this card signed at that post.

But, for now, I just want to celebrate. This is the last 2004 card that I will be posting at this time. I posted my first '04 card on the 19th of October and, with the exceptions of a few "Joy of a Complete Page" posts and a giveaway, it has been nothing but 2004 cards for six days a week. That all changes tomorrow, though. Tomorrow, I will be turning the clock back to 1949. So, make sure you check back in the next couple of days for a few signed vintage cards.

I will probably be starting my 2005 cards in about three weeks. Hopefully, '05 and '06 will go a little quicker than '04. I just wish I could say the same for '07 and '08.

One last thing- Does anyone know what set this set is supposed to resemble? It looks familiar to me, but I just cannot place it.

2004 Upper Deck Vintage, Gil Meche

#238 Gil Meche

I am short on time and need to be getting ready for a wedding. But I wanted to get in a post, so here is a short one.

Right now, Gil may be my favorite Royal and it's not because he is their ace pitcher. I like Gil because he has integrity, which is something that is rarely seen in professional sports anymore. Four years ago, Gil signed a five year/$55 million deal with the Royals. He became their ace by default and, as a result, he pitched too many innings and was generally overused by Trey Hillman. The end result was a torn-up shoulder that required surgery last season. Gil agreed to the surgery until he found out how long it was going to keep him out. Once he found out that he was going to miss all of 2011, the final year of his contract, he backed out.

Instead, he went on a rehab assignment to become a reliever and he finished the 2010 season in the Royals bullpen. He still pitches fine, he just doesn't have the stamina to pitch more than a couple of innings. It looks like he may be one of the set-up men for Joakim Soria this season and I wish him the best of luck.

I am just curious what Gil plans to do after 2011. Does he stay a reliever or does he have surgery, miss a season, and then try to get a one-year contract to prove that he has recovered? That is a tough position to put yourself in. But, as a Royals fan, I am proud that Gil had the integrity to fulfill his contractual obligation to the team.

Thank you, Gil. I wish that Zack would have followed your example.

This is the very first card that I got signed by Gil and I got it card signed at the first Royals Fanfest in 2008.